Daily News Digest

In this morning’s edition of the CyclingTips Daily News Digest: Greipel wins final stage of TdF; Anna Van der Breggen wins Le Course; Protester stands in middle of the peloton; Car smashes through barrier on Champs-Elysees; Trek Factory Racing confirms interest in signing Cavendish; Cancellara may ride one more Tour de France before retirement; Richie almost loses it!; Peter Sagain Je suis Charlie?; and much more…

Andre Greipel wins final stage of TdF on the Champs-Elysees

Echoing the four stage wins picked up by compatriot Marcel Kittel in 2013 and 2014, Andre Greipel proved he was the dominant sprinter of this year’s Tour de France when he blasted home to take his fourth victory in this year’s race.

Greipel hit the line first in Paris, beating a fast-finishing Bryan Coquard (Europcar). Alexander Kristoff (Katusha) led into the final 200 metres but was overhauled by both and had to be satisfied with third.

“I was not in the best position at the final bend. I was a bit far back, but I had the legs to finish it off,” said Greipel.

“I am looking forward to some rest now. This Tour de France had been amazing for us. There have been five bunch sprints and we won four of them.”

He was clear on which was the most important of those and, more so, of his period as a pro to date.

“I would say this is the biggest success of my career. It [Paris] is the sprinter’s capital. I am really happy I can win in the 2015 on the Champs Elysees. Nobody can take this away from my palmares now.”

Anna Van der Breggen wins Le Course with panache

La Course by Le Tour de France was meant to be a day for the sprinters, but Anna van der Breggen (Rabo Liv) elected to ignore that memo. Launching a powerful attack just inside the final lap of the 89km circuit around the Champs-Élysées in Paris on Sunday, Van der Breggen narrowly held off the peloton and crossed the finish line alone.

“You expect a sprint here – a bunch sprint – and there were a lot of good sprinters still in the bunch,” Van der Breggen told Ella following the race. “I didn’t expect this, and it is an amazing feeling.”

Just one second behind Van der Breggen, Jolien d’Hoore (Wiggle Honda) won the bunch sprint for second place. Amy Pieters (Liv Plantur) rounded out the podium.

“I’m happy with my second place,” d’Hoore told Ella in a post-race interview. “I did a good sprint. It’s too bad Anna got away. She was really strong today and already really strong the whole year. She deserved the win with the way she raced.”

Car smashes through barrier on Champs-Elysees

French police were searching Sunday for the driver of a car that smashed through a security barrier in central Paris near the finish line on the Champs-Elysees.

Police opened fire on the car, failing to stop it from speeding away after the incident in the Place de la Concorde at the foot of the Champs Elysees.

The bullet-ridden car was later found abandoned nearby.

No one is believed to have been hit as the police shot at the car, and police stated that no shots were fired from the car.

A police official told the Associated Press they believe the car’s driver likely was trying to avoid submitting to a police check after leaving one of the area’s nightclubs. The incident occurred around 7.50am local time.

Security in Paris has been heightened for months following extremist attacks which claimed 17 lives that began with the massacre at the satirical weekly Charlie Hebdo. However Interior ministry spokesman Pierre-Henry Brandet told AFP: “There is no clear link for the time being between this incident and the Tour de France finish.”

Trek Factory Racing confirms interest in signing Cavendish

Commenting on rumours linking Mark Cavendish to a possible move to Trek Factory Racing, the American team has confirmed that the multiple Tour stage winner is a clear person of interest.

“What I can say is that he is interesting for us and any team,” spokesman Tim Vanderjeugd told CyclingTips at the Tour de France.

“He is a phenomenal rider. If you look at how many times he has won in the Grand Tours and in the Tour de France especially, any team that is sane in their mind is definitely interested in him, and so are we.

“There have been talk but nothing has been decided or confirmed at this point. But he is an absolutely interesting rider for us.”

Cancellara may ride one more Tour de France before retirement

Although Fabian Cancellara said on the day he left the Tour de France that it was quite possibly his final participation in the event, his Trek Factory Racing team has confirmed that the Swiss rider might yet still line out in the event next season.

Cancellara has already said that 2016 will likely be his last season. However, according to Trek Factory Racing spokesman Tim Vanderjeugd, he is unlikely to walk away once the Classics are over.

“The plan is to do the entire season. He has definitely got his mind set on the Olympics because it is such an incredible experience,” he said.

“So I don’t think he will pull the plug before the Olympics. We will see how his shape is. But the plan is to do a full year.”

Full Chris Froome press conference audio

Chris Froome may not be the most popular winner of the Tour de France, but he certainly is very well spoken, gracious, and likeable. Have a listen to the full winner’s press conference at end of stage 20.

Greg LeMond demonstrates miniature hidden motor

There has been plenty of talk of hidden motors at this year’s Tour de France, yet some people remain sceptical about the technology and the threat of its use.

In order to address this, triple Tour winner Greg LeMond took delivery of a bike with a motor late on Friday and showed it to CyclingTips at Saturday’s stage finish in Alpe d’Huez.

He had the machine made to illustrate his concerns about the availability and potential of the technology.

“This model has three settings,” he explained. “It produces between 50 to 75 watts for about an hour and a half, does 150 watts for an hour and in its highest setting, produces 250 watts for up to 30 minutes.

Try riding it at racing speeds, 55 km/h for an hour or two. Bike rider’s seldom revert to old kit unless there’s a problem. I suspect it’s a wet day, and that,(braking) or perhaps handling (geometry, if it differs) might be why they preferred reliability of old, rather than new

Evan

If both Sagan and Cav did not ride the new Venge on the Camps-Elysees to win the most prestigious day for sprinters then clearly it is not good enough for the pro tour and possibly a nightmare for the average punter.

Neil

Bit of an overstretch, it depends on why they weren’t riding it. If it’s that they were worried about braking in the wet Spesh could easily come up with a redesign.

9news

Unconfirmed report of Lance Armstrong seen running from the bullet riddled dodgem car, then donning a white bedsheet with “What would Floyd Do?” written on it.

Arfy

Well that protester really got their message across. I have no idea what they were protesting about, the only thought I had was it’s a pity all the motos missed him.

sli1

I like Sagan, he’s a phenom. But fair dinkum………

chillout

Hes a kid, having fun on a podium. Everyone needs to lighten up.
He gets paid to push pedals, not be PC. Besides, its pretty tame next to Olegs rants and people pissin on Froomey.

muz

That’s the funniest moment over the last 3 weeks.

Arnie

I think it’s a reference to the Tourminator nickname they gave him. Harmless fun.

Cameron Harris

I wonder if Trek is one of the teams that Richie is meeting with? They haven’t had a GC contender since Andy Schlek left.

I don’t really get what Richie benefits from here. I reckon BMC will continue to back ‘their boy’ at the Tour and Richie will get the nod for the Giro. wasn’t that the arrangement at Sky already?

Whippet

You’re probably correct jules, but Richie benefits by continuing to get a big pay cheque. He was faced with a choice of joining a team with fewer resources as the sole leader, or joining a team with the finances and riders to contend for grand tour GC in the number two role. Remember, he didn’t leave Sky by choice.

jules

i didn’t know about the last bit – how do you know?

Whippet

You’re stretching the limits of my memory jules! I first recall hearing about it on The Cycling Podcast sometime during the spring classics. Then, there was quite a bit of talk about Porte and his agent around the time of the Giro. BBC Sport had an article in May about Porte looking for a new team. Cycling News then had an article in early June stating that Uran & Porte were both “out of contract”. It is possible that Richie told Sky that he would not stay on, but all the indications are that he was not offered a contract. That is the way it was reported here too: https://cyclingtips.com.au/2015/05/daily-news-digest-86/.

Dave

I would expect that one of the two following cases apply.

1. Sky offered Porte a cheap (or performance-loaded) renewal which was never intended to be accepted.

2. Porte felt forced into changing now at the age of 30, as his stocks would be even lower if he stayed with Sky for two more years of performing at the same plateaued level and then went on the market at the age of 32.

Wookie

I must admit I had similar thoughts. I don’t see the logic for either party is a BMC/Porte deal, apart from a pay rise for Richie, as noted by Whippet below… Wouldn’t it make more sense for Porte to join a team that’s obviously lacking a GC rider?

Kieran Degan

When does the transfer news usually come out?

Dave

Throughout the month of August. The teams have to keep up the pretence of not having been doing transfer deals before the window opens on August 1.

Dave

BMC could be a perfect place for Porte, he could get a decent paycheque working for the Gardener at the Tour and race for himself at the minor races.

Trek announced a couple years ago that they were rebuilding to position themselves as a Classics team. I’m sure that’ll change at some point, but I haven’t heard any indication about them interested in Richie.

Wookie

Maybe I’m barking up the wrong tree here, but didn’t they sign Mollema as their GC guy? I mean, he’s not a classics sort of a guy, right?

SBS, of course, thank’s. I just expect everything in an embedded youtube on the daily news digest. i’ve stopped actually thinking about finding content for myself :)

Adam

Wade did I see you on Alpe d’ Huez?

Adam

Wade did I see you on Alpe d’ Huez?

Sean

The ladies race was a lot better to watch. I never thought i’d say that.

Dave

A higher prizemoney-wage ratio will do that.

Dave

A higher prizemoney-wage ratio will do that.

Derek Maher

Got to agree Sean,Those ladies were far more aggressive even though the road surface was like a skating rink.
Some of them still got back on their bikes after hitting the deck multiple times.

Dave

Apples and oranges. One was a winner-takes-all scratch crit and the other was the final stage of a Grand Tour where 95% of the field was only interested in getting to the finish.

If the women’s peleton contested a stage race the same length as a Grand Tour (i.e. completing the nine Giro Rosa stages four times each) and then had a crit at the end I’m sure that most of the women’s field would approach the crit with the same attitude as the men’s peleton did last night.

When they contest major one day races, the men’s peleton does race aggressively enough for there to be crashes. The World Championship Road Race a couple of years ago was contested in much heavier rain than La Course was, and from memory every member of the Aussie team who was not eliminated by the aggressive pace was involved in at least one crash on their way to finishing.

Andy B

That race was carnage!

CC

TDF learnings for me this year… Sky’s Marginal Gains / untouchable attitude = people spitting, throwing piss, hitting riders… vs.. OGC (Aussie) champions, drinking laughing with fans. I’m starting to think the TDF is a race for the Fans, vs Giro which is for the riders?

RayG

I think you’re victim blaming there. Seems to happen a lot around cyclists.

Kieran Degan

I hope Hansen didn’t get the cup that was prepared for Froome.

jules

french police now looking for aussie fans after changing theory from cup being filled with piss to XXXX that just tastes like piss

dsd74

Or maybe it was an American fan throwing Budweiser or Coors Light on Froome? They’re both easily confused with piss…

Dave

Would there have been any American fans left? I would have expected them to go home and return their focus to beating the world at baseball as soon as their sole contender withdrew.

dsd74

Good point.
Though I think they lost the baseball final to Canada in the PanAm games… though as there is drug testing, I assume that they didn’t send the best players…

Dave

I’m pretty sure an American team will come up with the goods in the World [sic] Series.

Wish I was on the bike…

Gold…

Steel

I rode to work with a super high cadence in honour of Chris Froome today. Bloody hell it’s hard to coordinate your legs like that for a long period of time. Won’t try again.

Anyway, I for one am happy with outcomes of the race. Froome rode a brialliant race tactically – the time gains were there in the Pyrenees. Riders looked to spent by day four in the Alps to really gain much time on him.

Sagan was just so dominant in the points race. It’s a shame he didn’t get a stage, but you can’t help but be impressed by his consistent stage placings.

Also, it was nice to see the KOM ending up on the back of the GC winner. I’d like to think on a parcours like this, that someone would have to put in a spectacular effort to take this prize off the best GC rider.

Of course I won’t be holding my breath to see the power to weight analysis of Nairo Quintana who took 1.30 minutes out of the sky train on alpe duez. There’s no story in the natural altitude climber beating the so called robots from Sky.

jules

you need to train your legs to hold that cadence. you can definitely get better at it. actually CT had a good video on this that I used a while ago *plug* once Lance mastered cadence… you know the rest :)

Whippet

Actually, I think it was unfortunate that they changes the KOM classification this year. The race for the polka dot jersey was much more interesting in previous years. I suspect they will revert back the old points system next year, because I am not the only one who was disappointed. Doubling the points for stage wins and taking away points from the smaller climbs led to the red spots inevitably belonging to the GC winner. The 40th anniversary of the jersey was not the greatest.

Steel

Fair enough. In most year’s I’d agree, with this year how can you argue that anyone other than Chris Froome was the best climber?

Dave

I disagree.

I like that the points allocations have changed so that it focuses on the genuine mountains, and it was a live competition right up until the last climb of the last Alpine stage. Under the old King Of The Molehills rules it would have been stitched up by a rider from some minor team like Europcar or Bretagne well before the final weekend.

Instead of going backwards, the Tour should consider introducing a number of minor classifications to reward different aspects of the racing like the Giro d’Italia has. One of the Giro competitions awards points for the distance spent in breakaways, perhaps this could be copied but with additional points awarded for going over hills while in the break?

Whippet

If winning the KOM is just a function of going for the GC, then what is the point of having a polka dot jersey? The best climber of the Tour was Quintana, but Froome had the the most points. The point of the jersey used to be to reward someone who performed the best in the mountains, even though that person wasn’t the best at GC. The way it worked this year, it was like a series of crits, where the GC & best sprinter were inevitably the same person.

BRK

Wow… can’t believe the Tour is already over!! Congratulations to Froome. I can’t help but be impressed with the way he’s handled himself on and off the bike this last 3 weeks.
Love him or hate him, I was also impressed with the way Valverde rode… looked like unselfish riding to me.
Overall, I really enjoyed the Tour. Stage 20 was just such an amazing race/spectacle.

Kieran Degan

I agree. I reckon stage 20 is the most exciting stage I’ve seen since Galibier in 2011. Alpe d’Huez is a great spectacle. Even the riders usually in pain on a climb like that are lapping up the atmosphere.

Tom Wells

Disgusting the way the crowd at Dutch corner treated the riders from Team Sky. I wholeheartedly hope they all die in a fire.

horses

What makes you think it was any different for any other rider or car from other teams? The video from the car looks a lot Beardy McBeard’s description of his experience. Maybe they saw the beard and thought he was Wiiggns…

Derek Maher

Anyone else find it strange that the GC this year was reduced to 20 stages ?.

Dave

Are you referring to taking the times for stage 21 on the first pass through the finish line?

That’s a UCI rule for use when weather makes the conditions on a finishing circuit dangerous, it has been used previously in the Tour de France, the Giro d’Italia (a couple of years ago it was used on a stage in the first week) and in numerous other races. Not common, but not strange either.

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